clear, resonant, versatile

About the Instrument
This violin has a lovely clear resonance across registers and is responsive to its player. Its lovely auburn varnish is of the luthier’s own formulation, bringing out its strong medium curl along its single-piece back, ribs, and scroll. The maker’s name and insignia are branded near the end button. This violin is in excellent condition.

Interior label reads: “Ignaz Lutz / San Francisco, Cali. 1921” along with the maker’s signature and instrument number (136)
Length: 357 mm
Upper Bouts: 167 mm
Middle: 112 mm
Lower Bouts: 204 mm

About the Maker
Ignaz Anton Lutz (1882-1927) was born into a luthier family in Vienna, Austria. Lutz studied under his father, Ignaz Lutz I (who himself learned under Lutz’s grandfather). Lutz soon began working in ateliers in Vienna, Berlin, Paris, and London. By the time Lutz immigrated the United States, he was a highly regarded repairer and restorer of stringed instruments, particularly Italian violins. His atelier was on the main thoroughfare of San Francisco. Lutz owned the “Ehrlich” Stradivari of 1724 and used this instrument as his primary model for his own violins. His instruments often bear a notably beautiful reddish-brown lacquer of Lutz’s own formula that drew from the old masters, which he dubbed the “Cremona tone.” As with Stradivarius, Lutz hung his instruments in trees for over several warm, sunny, dry days—in Lutz’s case, in Bay Area cherry orchards. With no apprentice, the details of Lutz’s varnish formula died with him when he succumbed to a toxic nodular goiter. Overall, Lutz’s instruments emulate his dedication to classical designs and precision and his work was beloved by Fritz Kreisler, Carl Flesch, Mishel Piastro, and many others.